Reading: Ruth 1:1-5
The Book of Ruth is a delightful tale about a time of transition for the people of Israel in the promised land.
The people have been in the land for close to 200 years, and are still just twelve tribes loosely affiliated for their shared well-being. No king, no central government. Just a college of judges under God to rule over disputes within the tribes, and between the tribes.
It works well ... to a point ... beyond which ... well, that's where we get into them wanting to be, and finally becoming a kingdom like other kingdoms around them. Along the way, there are a lot of little pieces to put together, and a lot of little stories to meld into one.
We read about one of those little pieces today, in Ruth 1:1-5.
Long ago, in the days when the people were still ruled by judges, before Israel had a king, there was a famine in the land.
Which means still in the first stage of their life in the promised land, the people of Israel are finding the promised land not as perpetually prosperous as they maybe thought it was promised to be. There's drought and famine here, as much as anywhere else.
So a man named Elimelech, who belonged to the clan of Ephrath and who lived in Bethlehem in Judah, went with his wife Naomi and their two sons Mahlon and Chilion to live for a while in the country of Moab.
At this point, the story is dripping with bitter irony.
“Ephrath,” the name both of Elimelech’s clan and of the region where they live, means “fruitful” and “branching out in growth,” bringing to mind the fields of corn that normally grew there so plentifully. And “Bethlehem,” the name of his town, means “house of bread, house of food.” And neither name is true. At least not for now.
So “Elimelech leaves with his wife and two sons to live for a while in the country of Moab.” Moab is a neighbouring country just to the east of Judah, and it’s a nice enough country. It’s a green, verdant valley in the midst of desert all around it – a kind of “emerald in the sand.”
But it’s also the last country the first Israelites had to pass through on their way to the promised land. Which is why they think of it ever since as “that land just short of the promised land” – a kind of “nice, but no cigar” kind of place.
Plus, there are the people who live there. The Moabites, even though long ago they were distantly related to the people of Israel, are now their perpetual enemies. They follow a different God from Yahweh, and are always ready to reach into the land of Israel to try to undo anything good and permanent that the people of Israel are trying to do there.
So, back to the story of Elimelech and his family, after moving to live for a while among the Moabites.
While they were living there, Elimelech died (Oh, dear!), and Naomi was left alone with her two sons, who married Moabite women (Well, they did what they could to try to make a life there for themselves and their mother.) And then, about ten years later Mahlon and Chilion also died (Oh, my goodness!), and Naomi (the sole Israelite left alive in the story) was left all alone in the land of Moab, without husband or sons to care for her and protect her.
What a tragic tale! What a terrible end to Elimelech’s plan to provide for his family.
And this is a Word of God – part of our ancestors’ witness to the Word and Spirit of God at work in the world.
Reflection
What a tragic tale! What an unfortunate series of choices and consequences for Elimelech and his family. And unfortunately for Elimelech, this is all we know about him, and this is how he is known forever.
This summer Italy and England met in the final game for the Euro Cup. The game ended 1-1. After a scoreless overtime session, the continental championship came down to penalty kicks. After nine dramatic kicks, with Italy ahead 3-2, there was one kick yet to come for England. Nineteen-year-old Bukayo Saka, one of the youngest players on the English squad, lined up for the kick, took his run, and sent the ball screaming not quite far enough over to the right goal post, and into the arms of the diving Italian goal-keeper.
Italy are now the champions. And as one commentator said after the game, that missed penalty kick will be how young Bukayo Saka is known for the rest of his life. And the commentator knows what he’s talking about, because the same thing happened to him in his now-over soccer career.
The world and other people can do that to us. See a mistake we’ve made, focus on a series of blunders we make, highlight one side of our history or personality of life story that’s not very good, maybe is very bad, and let that become our whole identity.
Like Elimelech. We know one thing about him – the outcome to one decision he made for his family that turned out tragically. And that’s how he is now known forever.
Sometimes we even do this to ourselves.
I think of my dad, a self-taught draughtsman, engineer and carpenter. He accomplished a lot. He built and maintained a lot of good things. But he was perfectionistic, his own worst critic, and whenever he finished making or doing something, often all he could see was the flaw in it, and then beat himself up for being incompetent and unaccomplished. For him, that’s what stood out, and it was an identity he built up for himself over the years.
I can’t begin to tell you how much I’ve been formed in the same mold. I can tell you, though, that I’m old enough to know full well the meaning of regret, guilt and self-judgement, without yet being wise enough always to put it all into perspective.
And how can we? How can we put what we do and who we are into full and proper perspective? Being as close as we are to the subject of ourselves, perspective is pretty well impossible.
Like for Naomi, Elimelech’s widowed wife – the last living member of the family that went to live in Moab, it’s so easy and natural to be dominated by the present moment. Just look at Naomi’s name, for instance, and how she identifies herself at different points along the way.
At the beginning of the story, she is “Naomi,” meaning “pleasant.” But as her story unravels, at one point she says, “No longer call me Naomi (pleasant). From now on, call me Marah (meaning, bitter). For God has made my life bitter. When I left Bethlehem, I had much; now, I am returning with nothing. So I am no longer Naomi. My name is Marah.”
What an outcome for Naomi to suffer. And what a legacy for Elimelech to have left. And what a sign of how easy it is for our understanding and assessment of ourselves, of others, of God, and of the time we are living in, to be shaped and defined by whatever the present moment feels like.
But is that the whole story? Is that a faithful way to live the life we are given?
All of this so far is based on the first five verses of chapter 1 of the Book of Ruth. But The Book of Ruth has 4 chapters and by the end of it, Naomi ends up back in Bethlehem, taken care of by her dead husband’s extended family, and in time revered as the mother-in-law of the great-grandmother of David, the greatest king the people of Israel were ever to have. And all because – this is the kicker – all because of one of the Moabite daughters-in-law that her husband’s seemingly fruitless life landed her with. We need to think about this.
You just never know until you are far enough removed from it, to be able to see what it all means and adds up to.
Which isn’t to say that Elimelech himself suddenly becomes a hero. That’s not what this is about. This isn’t Hollywood. It’s the Bible and it’s real life. And even at the end, with the turn the story takes, Elimelech’s name still doesn’t appear in the genealogical list of King David. He’s still just the guy sadly buried back in the opening verses somewhere in Moab – just short of the promised land, along with his two dead sons. That doesn’t change.
But when we see the whole story, we wonder if maybe we’ve judged him too harshly. Given too much weight to one part of his story, and just one way of looking at it. And not sufficiently valued other parts of it – like how he did the best he knew at the time to try help his family survive the famine in the land of Judah. How out of love for his family he risked moving to Moab for a while because Bethlehem just seemed like a death trap. How in some way he was kind of like old Abram, the father of them all, who long ago started the whole story by up and leaving his father’s house for another place and another kind of life that God put into his mind.
Which doesn’t mean Elimelech gets his name in lights because of what he did. That’s not the goal. But he did his part as faithfully as he knew how, regardless of the outcome to him. Which is why God and other people could then do their parts too.
Elimelech’s name, by the way, means “my God is king.” It’s a good name to live by, and be known by. Unlike his wife, who got caught in the trap of trying to see the big picture through too small a lens, Elimelech’s identity does not change and does not have to be changed. The meaning of his life is able to stand and to withstand no matter what comes.
And isn’t that what it’s about? Not trying to know what the final word, the final judgement is on our own our anyone else’s life or any part of it. But just doing our part as faithfully as we know how, as others do their part as it’s revealed to them, all under the purposeful gaze and the patient, providential nudging of God whose bigger story of life we all really are part of.
I have a few ideas about what this means for me – and how I look at myself, at others, and at God.
Even more, though, what do you think it means for you? And how you see your life? Others? And God above it all?
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